Tag: Darktable

After writing two articles on the Nature of Light and its relevance to digital photography, I found that the subject of noise still fascinated me and decided that I had to make some measurements. Looking at the wiggly waveforms of my previous article might indicate that camera A is noisier than camera B but can we measure the noise in a rigorous way? This present article explains how to do that using free software. As well as presenting graphs of the measurements I have attempted to explain the results from physical principles – and evidently the noise is predominantly photon noise (aka shot noise).

Comparison of Demosaicing Methods available in Free, Open Source Raw Processors

My previous article included a table listing the various demosaicing algorithms offered by the four raw processors considered and I wondered why we (as users) needed such a wide choice. The table is reproduced below.I decided to investigate those offered by RawTherapee by looking closely at the detail in an image of tree branches against the sky – the same part of the same raw file processed by each of the algorithms.

With the exception of Darktable, which is not yet available for Windows, all of the applications are available for Windows, Mac and Linux. All are free and open source downloads.

I am looking for a raw file processor that will allow me to develop raw images to produce files ready for projection (at 1400 x 1050 pixels) and files at full resolution for further development, as necessary, to make high quality prints. I don’t expect to print directly from the raw processing application though this might be an advantage.

I have used both RawTherapee and Darktable for over a year and have recently tried Lightzone and Photivo so I will restrict my comments to these four.